


Blood & Berry Coulis

by Cryptographic_Delurk



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age II
Genre: Aveline Critical, Blood Magic, Bloodplay, Cunnilingus, Dirty Spells, F/F, Frottage, I am Weak and Aveline’s Gap Moe Game is Too Strong, Knifeplay, Mid-Canon, Muscles, Pre-Dragon Age II - Act 3, Sadist Merrill, Size Difference, but in an ‘I still want to kiss her and make her breakfast’ kind of way, hematolagnia, one-sided Merrill/Isabela & Aveline/Isabela & Aveline/Donnic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:33:58
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26778934
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cryptographic_Delurk/pseuds/Cryptographic_Delurk
Summary: Aveline comes to Merrill for consult on how to handle and apprehend blood mages.Merrill would rather not oblige her but, when the opportunity for a hands on demonstration arises, the issue becomes confused to say the least.
Relationships: Merrill/Aveline Vallen
Comments: 2
Kudos: 13





	Blood & Berry Coulis

**Author's Note:**

> This fic kinda circles themes about police brutality and institutionalised corruption. Sorry for making it real. And while the sexy stuff itself isn’t coerced, Merrill advising Aveline on the subject of blood magic is. And Merrill has some trouble separating her frustration with Aveline from the fun and loving aspects of BDSM play. So I think you can file all that under consent issues.
> 
> I continue to want more Merrill knifeplay and bloodplay fics. Any ship. Someone feed me.

“You want my help with _what_?”

Merrill let the final word take on an indignant squawk, and let the teacup clatter in her hand as she set it down in front of Aveline.

Aveline shovelled far too many teaspoons of honey into the cup and gave her the look. The one that said ‘You can not possibly be this stupid.’

And Merrill wasn’t, she’d been waiting for the other shoe to drop since Aveline arrived. But the important part was never confirming it for anyone else. Let them fill in the gaps and decide how much Daisy knew.

“Apostates. Blood Mages. Maleficars.” Merrill noted the heavy Ferelden in Aveline’s accent, even now six years a Marcher. The way she eschewed the proper genitive, _Maleficarum._ “I want your advice on how to find them. And fight them,” Aveline finished curtly.

Merrill took her seat across the table from Aveline. “But why come to me? I don’t run about with mages and apostates. Why don’t you go ask Anders?” she said curiously.

Aveline did not leave things unsaid this time. “You cannot possibly be this stupid.”

Merrill giggled into her cup of yerba mate. It wasn’t stupidity if it was taunting. “He won’t give you the time of day, will he? I bet when you march on Darktown he packs up his clinic and relocates, just for you~”

“Evil tease,” Aveline scoffed under her breath. She shifted uncomfortably in her seat and took a few quick sips of tea, red lips staining the glass. Her armour creaked. Even here, in this most raw and bare of spaces, she was guarded and buried in metal.

Merrill wasn’t sure why _she_ was giving Aveline the time of day. Perhaps Anders had the right of it. Aveline was who she was, and Merrill doubted she would change her, and all of the People in the Alienage cowered and hid when the guard patrolled for a reason. Maybe she entertained Aveline _because_ Anders had the right of it, only Merrill didn’t want to be an angry bitter old man like him, who gave up on people before he’d even given them a chance.

“They’ve been running rampant,” Aveline said. “Without someone in the Viscount’s seat, this city is falling apart.”

 _And you think you’ll be the one to fix it?_ Merrill thought. But there was a problem more close to home, Merrill was sure. “You’re having trouble with the guard,” she guessed.

“They’re factionalised and cliquish at one moment, and unified against me the next,” Aveline agreed. “My attempts to root out corruption have alienated as many as it’s pleased. But,” she paused doubtfully, “I can prove myself to them! So long as I have the skills to assist them on the front lines.”

Aveline was trying the best way she knew how. And Merrill saw this. But Aveline was more than a capable fighter, and she was playing to her strengths rather than covering her weaknesses. What she really needed was someone to help her be charismatic and well spoken as a leader. But, then, Merrill wasn’t very good at those things either, was she? She wasn’t really the right person for Aveline to have come to.

“Isabela was right,” Merrill said. “You really should have just should have been clear and told him how you felt. Oh, what was his name – the one you liked?” Aveline had probably given him so many mixed messages, he barely knew how to interpret them. Nobody liked that in a boss. “Isabela would have known what to do,” Merrill said wistfully.

“Isabela brought a furious, raving band of Qunari to this city, and then walked as soon as it looked like she might have to face the consequences of any of it,” Aveline snapped.

Merrill pursed her lips. _And the Guard, the Keep, and the Chantry combined had done nothing but pour fuel onto the fire until the entire city was burning_. Only it wouldn’t do any good to say that.

Oh, Isabela would know what to say. She and Aveline had bickered, but in the end she’d hooked one arm around Aveline and Merrill each. _Girls Night Out!_ she’d say, and drag them into all sorts of shops and pubs and trouble. And Isabela had been so lively and lovely, and Aveline watched her with a fantastic blush colouring her freckled face. And even when Merrill laughed at her they had both found it in each other to smile, because they were both the same with stars in their eyes and endless affection for the woman flitting about in front of them.

Isabela had taken all that life and joy with her when she’d left. Now all that remained was red skies and patrolling templars and wailing mages – too crowded, too empty, and cracked. Merrill thought Isabela had the right idea when she’d run from this accursed city and hadn’t looked back. Only Merrill wished sometimes Isabela had thought to take her along when she fled. It wouldn’t have worked, because Merrill had her mirror and her cause and her People. But it would have been nice if Isabela had asked all the same.

Isabela would have known what to do.

“Won’t you take off your armour?” Merrill looked away, to her bookshelf. She categorised the contents in her head.

“Why do you ask?” Aveline replied, pulling at the bandanna that covered her throat.

“You’re a guest in my home. And it looks terribly uncomfortable,” though Merrill still didn’t look at it. It was intimidating. A reminder – even if Aveline wasn’t able to take her in a fight, she could make Merrill’s life very difficult.

“It’s not uncomfortable,” Aveline said curtly.

Aveline had run out of tea, and Merrill poured her more and lifted the top of the honey pot. When Aveline reached for the spoon, Merrill brushed the tips of her fingers against Aveline’s.

Aveline startled, and turned a familiar shade of red.

“See,” Merrill said. “It’s more cosy and comfortable without.”

Aveline mumbled under her breath. “That’s not exactly what I’d call comfortable.”

Merrill stretched out her legs under the table and let her feet rattle against Aveline’s boots and knee guards. “Well, this isn’t either, you have to admit.”

“It keeps away poor attempts at footsie,” Aveline said.

Merrill pouted. “Are my attempts poor then?”

Aveline smirked and raised her teacup to her lips with a primly extended pinky. “You’ll just have to up your game.”

The moment lingered awkwardly, with Merrill tapping her foot against the floor in rhythm.

Aveline sighed and, with an anxious purse of her lips, reached across the table and traced the pads of her fingers across Merrill’s cheek, swooping along the lines of Falon’Din.

“I-Is this comfortable?” Aveline asked, with a little tremble in her voice. “Does it hurt?”

“It’s vallaslin,” Merrill answered. But the words didn’t mean anything to shems. And, after a moment of Aveline’s blank look and still hand, Merrill added, “I’m not Fenris.”

A few more pads of Aveline’s thumb, before she pulled back, and curled her arm over her chest.

Merrill sighed. She wasn’t going to be the one to help Aveline, but maybe that was better. “What is it you want me to do for you?”

“I’ve never fought a blood mage before.” Aveline looked down at her tea, like it had surprised her. “At least not directly, up close. I don’t know what it’s like to try to throw off a thrall.”

“You haven’t?” Merrill asked. “Well that’s strange. I’m pretty sure Hawke fought and killed a dozen last week. They didn’t take you along for any of the excitement?” She tilted her head. “You’re really not their favourite, are you?”

She could tell it stung by the way Aveline winced. But then Merrill knew it would, because it would have stung if someone else said it to her. Neither of them was Hawke’s favourite.

“Merrill…” Aveline sighed at the lack of social grace.

“So you want me to thrall you somewhere safe and… _comfortable_? So you can know what it’s like, and what to do about it?” Merrill asked warily.

“Well, don’t get too excited about it,” Aveline said sarcastically.

“And why should I do this for you?” Merrill asked. She had asked Aveline to look after Hawke, if anything happened, and Aveline wouldn’t commit to that. And she’d asked Aveline to look after Anders and Varric too, and been met with similar non-answers. Aveline asked Merrill for things, and did nothing for her in return.

“I haven’t disturbed you, have I? You weren’t doing much of anything else when I came in.” Aveline frowned and affected a firmer voice. “Because I asked nicely. And I am your Captain of the Guard.”

 _You’re a bad guard_ , Merrill thought. _Trading your position for favours._ Aveline had also never answered her question from so long ago. _Why don't you arrest us? We break the law. You're not a bad guard, are you?_ Aveline hadn’t answered. Only sputtered and squirmed at the accusation, until Merrill let her off the hook.

But if Aveline was a better guard she’d have arrested them, or worse. If Aveline was a better guard, she’d know how to make peace with her force and the competing interests in the Keep instead of rattling off about principles. If Aveline was a better guard, a guard that did her job as it had been designed, she would never fumble and lose sight of the fact that she existed to keep the strata of Kirkwall separate – to protect the Hightown nobles from the Lowtown servants from the Darktown rabble. She’d never let herself be distracted by doubts and affections and people like Isabela or Merrill.

If Aveline was a better guard, Merrill would not be sitting here entertaining tea with her. If Aveline was a better guard, Merrill would not have been able to _like_ her. She could only hope that Aveline would become a worse guard. Worse and worse and worse, until she drove the Keep to ruin and ran off as free as Isabela.

“If I do it will you take off your armour?” Merrill asked.

“You’re asking me?” Aveline seemed incredulous.

“Sure,” Merrill agreed. “Although once you’re thralled I can make you do it either way.”

Aveline snorted a laugh, and it was almost pretty. She stood and began to remove her chain and plate. When she was halfway done, she laughed again. “Plan to have me remove anything else?”

“Only if you’d like,” Merrill hummed, pleased.

Aveline bit her lip, her cheeks glowing in the firelight and dusk streaming from the broken window. She piled her armour against the wall, under the table. Underneath her clothes were simple white linen and red tartan. She hesitated a moment, before pulling her shirt above her head. She hung it over the back of the chair, before sitting back down.

She crossed and uncrossed her arms several times, before forcing them stiffly to her sides. And Merrill admired the flex of them. Biceps, pectorals, abdomen. The definition of muscle, red and wet under the skin, pulled taut over Aveline’s torso. She had a simple cloth brassiere pulled over her chest, and Merrill tried to diagram in her head where the sinewy line of muscle that criss-crossed under the cloth turned to indistinct saggy flesh and red nipples.

“I haven’t done anything like this in a long time,” Aveline said stiffly. “But I suppose I’m up for it. It’s not entirely unrelated to the exercise at hand either.” She watched Merrill intently for a moment, and then laughed. “Well, you sure do know how to make a woman feel worth looking at. And here I thought I must look childish in this ratty old thing. It’s nothing like a corset.”

Merrill realised she must be leering and turned her head down to the table.

“It’s all right,” Aveline said. “I’m not really sure what draws me to people. But even if you’re not who I might have thought I’d go for, you’re not bad to look at yourself.”

Merrill squeezed her lips into a small curling smile. “So you’d like to see more of me?” she asked.

“If you’d like,” Aveline parroted back at her.

Merrill was trying not to be so terribly shy. She tried to meet Aveline’s eyes, and let her eyes drop somewhere near her chin instead. “If I’d like,” she repeated.

“Anything you’d like,” Aveline said. “However you’d like. As you said, I won’t have much choice, so long as you have me thralled. So long as you can hold it.”

Oh, this was… counterproductive. But tempting. Merrill supposed she had been the one to start it. And Aveline was so beautiful! And-

“Wait, we are talking about sex, aren’t we?” Merrill asked. Because Aveline was often in a bad mood when the subject came up and what if Merrill had missed something again. “With each other, I mean, to be clear?”

Aveline heaved a sigh. “Yes, Merrill,” she said tersely, and rubbed at her head like it ached.

Well, that wasn’t very nice of her, Merrill thought. The trade tongue wasn’t Merrill’s first language, and she was always misunderstanding things. And she’d only asked to be polite and considerate, and to make sure she wouldn’t do anything Aveline didn’t like. It was unfair of Aveline to treat that like an annoyance.

Merrill had the knife out and slicing over her finger before she could even think about it. The knife was a matter of safety. She had it at her belt during the day, or lined next to her quills at the writing desk in the evening, or under her pillow while she was sleeping at night. She could not be without it. And the blood was a matter of pride. Because everyone scoffed at her for asking things or for not knowing what they did or for knowing things that they didn’t, and Aveline had given her permission not to take that. Not from her.

Merrill turned her hand and let the blood drip in a long line from her index finger to the dirt floor of her hovel. And there the blood misted, the way it did when you used it for magic – static in the air. It spread out, like an extension of Merrill’s fingers, to reach out into the mice in the walls and squirrels in the rafters and into Aveline, who was a healthy pulsing welt of blood and muscle and power.

Aveline must not have been expecting it to happen so quickly, because she looked panicked as the paralysis lifted up through her legs and arms. And Merrill felt the blood flowing into and out of the muscles of her larynx, and it was better sometimes when Aveline didn’t talk.

“It’s alright. I’ve got you,” Merrill said with a soothing hush.

She placed the saucers and teacups and honeypot to one side of the round table, and climbed atop it, crouching down on both feet. She crossed it in awkward scurrying movements of her legs, and flipped herself over the other side of it, so she sat over the edge with her feet pressed against Aveline’s abdomen and stomach. She leaned forward and ran hands up Aveline’s shoulders, and then one up through her head.

“It’s just me,” Merrill said, and gave a small encouraging smile. It was just Merrill, reaching outside of herself and into someone else to take control of flesh and blood that were in better hands with her.

Oddly, Aveline did seem to relax. Her eyes darted less. Merrill could feel her heart rate slow.

“I don’t really understand why you’d want to do this,” Merrill said, before reaching for Aveline’s hand and pressing the tip of her knife against her palm, so her blood misted and mingled with Merrill’s. She wondered how long she could hold Aveline like this, before they were both delirious from blood loss.

“I mean, not sex with me,” Merrill clarified. “Though I don’t really understand that either. I’m very plain and dry and unexciting. And all I do is make mistakes and I’m not sure anyone can stand me,” she babbled. And it was a comfort that Aveline could not comfort her in this state. Merrill laced the fingers of her free hand together with Aveline’s. “But I don’t really understand what you want me to show you. Or why you’d mix sex with it. It’s rather unprofessional of you. Which I guess is exciting, but it’s not very much like normal you.”

Merrill sat there for a moment, tracing Aveline’s fingers and wrist and all the freckles on the back of her hand.

“You can speak,” Merrill said finally, and let her go.

Aveline clenched and unclenched her jaw. “I didn’t think it would be so forceful… Very secure.”

“Thank you,” Merrill said. Because she had spent more than six years working blood magic now, and it could only be a compliment that she’d gotten very good at it. “Now explain the things I don’t understand.”

“I don’t know, Merrill,” Aveline sighed. “Like I said, it’s been a very long time. Maybe I miss when we used to have fun.”

Merrill softened. That part she understood. She scraped her big toe over Aveline’s abdomen affectionately.

“And, as I said, it’s not entirely unrelated to the exercise at hand,” Aveline added. “It’s not like blood mages shy away from forcing themselves on others.”

It felt like a slap to the face. _Neither do city guards_ , Merrill thought poisonously. Because nobody cared when the elvhen were the victims. That had been what caused the Qunari rampage, hadn’t it? Ten days on the wall.

“So… you want me to play rapist?” Merrill asked.

“It’s not like I’m not giving you permission,” Aveline said sharply. “There’s no need for that tone.”

“Tone? There was no tone.” Though Merrill was not sure that was true. “I was only asking,” she amended, more softly.

“Just show me whatever you think a maleficar might do,” Aveline said calmly.

Maleficarum lied about the women they dragged about, and killed Hawke’s mother, and begged so they may feed their starving children, and wailed and cried as the templars cut them down. They were all off doing different things, away from her. Merrill had no idea what any of them might do.

She had so few friends and supporters, certainly none that shared blood magic with her. This wasn’t something her Keeper had shown her, with a community at her back and Hahren Paivel to narrate their stories. This was what she had been cast out for – why she’d spent these years in Kirkwall alone.

She knew what at least one maleficar would have liked to do though. Aveline was so bashful and beautiful, and all Merrill had to do was peel away her layers and reach inside her skin.

The blood sizzled off of Merrill’s fingers and Aveline’s palm and Aveline was all hers again.

“Lift your arms,” Merrill said, although she didn’t need to. She tucked her fingers under the bottom fringe of Aveline’s cloth brassiere and went to pull it over her head. And it was strange, because Merrill did not usually get so close to those she thralled. She stood at a safe distance with Hawke and Fenris between her and those she made to rend and die. It was strange, moving Aveline’s arms so close and brushing hers, coordinating like it was only an extra set of her own limbs as they pulled the brassiere up and free behind Aveline’s head.

Aveline was made to hand it to her, and Merrill folded it neatly in her hands and set it on the table.

Merrill crossed her arms over her knees and leaned forward to press their lips together chastely. Aveline’s lips were cool, and of course unresponsive. Merrill wondered if Aveline would have responded, if she’d let her.

Merrill swung her legs around and hopped off the table.

“Let’s move to the other room,” she said, and took Aveline’s hand, pulled her out of her seat and had her walk after. Like a parody of something sweeter. She stood Aveline in front of her bed and examined her.

Aveline was tall, so tall. Merrill only came partway up her torso. Would she even fit comfortably on the length of Merrill’s bed? And she was broad in the shoulders, and filled out with muscle everywhere. The freckles were everywhere, and skin in creamy whites and pinks. Her nipples were as red as Merrill had thought they might be.

“Shoes off,” Merrill commanded lightly. And bent down to help Aveline with them. Unlacing the boots and pulling them free.

She tossed them to the side, and when she stood back up she pressed directly onto her toes, leaning into Aveline’s chest to lick and bite around her areola in wide, ovular circles, before nibbling at the nipples growing erect in the centre.

Merrill blushed and looked up at her, but though she could feel the blood rushing over Aveline’s cheeks and neck, close to the surface of sensitive skin, Aveline could not look down.

“You’re quite sturdy,” Merrill noted.

She wasn’t sure if she had actively set Aveline in such a firm stance, with her feet flat on the ground the same width apart as her shoulders and her stomach tightened and firm and bearing the weight of her back, or if Aveline’s muscle memory had filled in the gaps between what Merrill’s magic instructed.

Merrill decided to test its limits. She held Aveline’s stance firm with blood as she braced herself against the floor and pressed against Aveline’s stomach with her palms. She tried to topple the woman however she could, pressing against her chest, or ramming her with her shoulder, or trying to trip and flip her down at the ankles. Aveline would not budge.

“See, I could never do this without magic,” Merrill informed her. She let Aveline’s blood drain back, so her muscles went limp, and shoved her over with only the slightest press of an open palm.

Aveline collapsed against the bed less than delicately, but Merrill had been careful not to topple her so her head might hit against the opposite wall.

Merrill arranged her on the bed, mostly through her own efforts. Grunting indelicately as she dragged Aveline’s legs up onto the bed with both arms, and arranging her comfortably on her back.

Merrill climbed up on the bed, so she was sitting partly atop Aveline’s right leg. She pulled the knife from her belt. “I’m going to cut your trousers off,” she announced. “For now at least. We’ll probably cut more than that later, if I’m playing the evil maleficar doing naughty things and cutting you up for sacrifice.”

Aveline didn’t seem to have a significant reaction to this, so Merrill made good on the promise, cutting through tan linen and tartan. She was a nice maleficar, so she cut along the seams where it’d be easy to sew up later, and tugged the trousers off and tossed them to the floor. She cut Aveline’s underthings too, so they hung limply off the left side of her hip, before Merrill pulled them off the one leg they were still attached too. She tried not to let herself be distracted by the puffy mound of Aveline’s sex, covered in hair darker than the red and gold fuzz on her legs, before climbing up to straddle Aveline’s chest.

She lifted Aveline’s neck and placed the knife behind her head, ever so delicately. And Aveline seemed to take this calmly until Merrill reached up and grabbed her by the hair with the other hand, twisting Aveline’s thickly bound ponytail of bright red hair into her fist and pulling. She flipped the blade of the knife away from Aveline’s neck, so it curled up to snip at the underside of the ponytail.

“I could cut off your hair,” Merrill said. “Change what you look like, how people see you, who you are.”

That got Aveline’s heart rate going, let the panic shine through her eyes and straight up at Merrill.

Merrill laughed. “Don’t like that, do we?” She made as if she was considering it for a moment, before releasing her grip on Aveline’s hair, and turning the knife to pull it carefully out from behind the nape of Aveline’s neck. “It’s alright,” Merrill said. “We’re just playing pretend, after all. Just so long as you remember I could have done it, and not everyone will be so nice.”

She smirked down at Aveline, who seemed calmer, but not that calm.

“You can speak,” Merrill said. And let her.

“You know, you can be a real bitch,” was the first thing Aveline said.

 _Ooh, an epithet all my own._ Merrill giggled and bounced a little excitedly on Aveline’s chest.

“Well, I’m completely naked here,” Aveline said flatly. “And you’re still fully dressed. I thought I was going to get to _see more of you_?”

“I thought it was only if I’d like to show you?” Merrill retorted. Oh, but the expression Aveline made at that. “Oh, don’t pout,” Merrill said. “I’ll get there eventually. Don’t be greedy.”

Aveline seemed occupied with other things at this point. “How is anyone supposed to break out of this kind of control?” she said, sounding lost, maybe even a bit despairing.

 _Force of will. Power of magic_ , were the closest things Merrill had to answers. She wondered if another blood mage would have had the power and experience to hold Aveline as completely and tightly as she did. Or maybe she should be holding Aveline even tighter. If this was a battle, a matter of life and death, if this was about showing Aveline the real thing, Merrill would have bled herself out more until it hurt and strangled Aveline with the blood. This here was child’s play – a little game like baby kittens batting at each other with paws that hadn’t yet grown claws.

“Isn’t that for you to figure out?” she asked Aveline flippantly. She didn’t want to show Aveline how to break out of her control. She didn’t want to give Aveline the power to hunt and kill people like her. But could Merrill live with herself if Aveline got into a confrontation with a blood mage and couldn’t protect herself because of Merrill? _Could she?_

She didn’t want to think about this anymore, so she stopped Aveline from talking and kissed down her square jaw. She moved down, placing kisses along neck and shoulders and breasts, then Aveline’s abdomen and the slight paunch of stomach right before her groin.

Merrill spread Aveline’s legs so she could sit comfortably between them, and couldn’t help but salivate at what spread out before her. Aveline was already flushed and wet. And very pink, and Merrill was sure there wasn’t anywhere on her own body that she was quite such a lovely pink – she was all patches of yellow and grey and different shades of brown criss crossed over each other in some overly complicated pattern. But Aveline- There was a gap in the curve of Aveline’s lips that seemed to just beg for Merrill to nuzzle her face into. And her whole face could probably fit – Aveline was as large here as she was everywhere else.

She traced Aveline with her fingers, outlining where her sex curved into her buttocks, and then up to circle around her hood at the front, and teasing out her clit. And that was on the large side as well. And Merrill vividly remembered Isabela lying with her back on the mattress and her legs up the wall, no underclothes, and flipping through the deck they’d been using to play Wicked Grace.

She’d had this gold nub pierced through her hood, and Merrill had looked at it entranced and lost the next ten consecutive hands of Wicked Grace and all her clothes in the process. But Isabela had never looked at her with the same kind of raw want. She’d only laughed and answered all of Merrill’s questions in this condescending little lilt:

_No, kitten, it only hurt a little. It doesn’t hurt at all now. I decided to get it myself, nobody made me. No, not all humans have them. Not everyone in Rivain either, kitten._

And Merrill had wanted more than anything to put her mouth there, flick it with her tongue, and fill all Isabela’s deficiencies and lick, lick away all her problems. But Isabela had called her a sweet, good heart, and that was how she liked Merrill, on the right side of good and innocent. And Merrill couldn’t bear to disappoint her.

Oh, Merrill wished she had done it now, though. She should have done it, before Isabela had run off and she’d lost her chance entirely.

She wouldn’t make the same mistake twice, is what she thought, as she leaned forward and rolled her tongue around Aveline’s hood. She alternated the curling press of her tongue with little kisses and bites at the wrinkly skin, before suckling on her clit. She tasted clear and good, and Merrill pressed her mouth in and out, to match the blood flushing and pulsing on the other side of Aveline’s skin.

She licked and pressed and sucked, and she felt Aveline’s thighs trying to quiver and squeeze, and Merrill was acutely aware that Aveline could probably crush and strangle her between them, if Merrill wasn’t holding her back and apart. Merrill leaned back and pressed her hands to the sides of them, gently rolling her hands over the muscle, covered with only the barest layer of fat, feeling over them for the occasional pockmark.

She pressed back in and sucked harder, and kissed better. And if this had been one of her usual victims, she wouldn’t have let them think. When she rended people’s blood for Hawke and the others to kill, she churned the blood in their heads and made them delirious and hazy and tried her best to give them good dreams, so their final moments didn’t have to be someone slicing them apart. She probably could have found a way to make Aveline all hazy and soft in the head too, maybe even less lethally. But in the end she wanted Aveline to feel all of this and think all of this and be there to curse and beg Merrill for every second of it. So instead she let Aveline go a little, lightened the touch of her magic so Aveline had the freedom to moan and pant and whimper.

“Oh, that’s a little bit- Mmm, I’m making progress. Oh, that’s good,” she could hear Aveline say, before sinking into little gasps.

Merrill giggled. It was only cuter if Aveline thought that she was regaining control of herself on her own terms. She lapped a few times more with her tongue, before sitting back up and rubbing at her mouth with her arm.

She found the knife, discarded on the bed in a spot that was less than safe – when had Merrill done that? She flipped it back up in her hand and went to straddle Aveline’s hips.

“This is where I’d start cutting you so I could do a few more spells with you,” Merrill explained, lifting the knife up so that Aveline could see it clearly. “Are we ready for a little ritual?”

Aveline didn’t seem as bothered as Merrill might have thought, because she just whimpered a bit more and the blood rushed to her eyes. And that didn’t change when Merrill flipped the knife down and placed the sharp end of the blade vertically up the right side of Aveline’s hip.

Aveline hissed and seized up when she pressed the blade in. Merrill relished the way she shifted with increasing rigidity under Merrill’s thighs. She took her time and drew the knife all the way up the side of Aveline’s torso in one long, clean stroke. And Aveline’s hiss transformed slowly into a peeling moan of pain.

Merrill removed the knife just before she could get too far into Aveline’s underarm. They both let out a heavy sigh of satisfaction and relief once it was done.

“Very good,” Merrill said, running her left hand along the cut and coating her fingers in the blood. “Now the other side?”

But, Creators help her, Merrill was trying to sound calm but she was starting to panic. But what if she’d gone too far and hurt Aveline too much? What if all Aveline could do was hate her after? What if all Merrill was doing was hurting more people she loved?

There were other thoughts, too. Rationalisations. Aveline was Captain of the Guard and used to these kind of scrapes. And they all got hurt far worse on a normal day’s outing with Hawke. And this cut was so shallow, not intended to do much more than sting.

But Aveline was also Captain of the Guard and what were Merrill’s rationalisations and interpretations and words over hers?

And it was hard, so hard to pretend you knew what you were doing and had everything under control when the whole world and all the demons of the Fade were just waiting for you to slip up.

“Merrill… Merrill…”

Aveline’s voice brought her back, and Merrill fumbled the knife and must have looked like a lost and foolish child for a moment.

“It’s all right,” Aveline said in a firm, reassuring voice.

Merrill pursed her lips and gritted her teeth and didn’t hesitate before slicing the knife into Aveline’s other side and listening for the wail.

 _You’re a bad guard. You’re a bad guard,_ Merrill whispered furiously, as she dragged the knife up to its peak. But the façade was sliding back into place, and Merrill let it transform her words. She gave Aveline a smug smirk. “You’re a bad guard, aren’t you? A naughty, dirty guard – consorting with blood mages, like this.”

Aveline whined from the pain, and gasped when Merrill removed the knife. “Yes, I’m very bad,” Aveline huffed, with an amused smirk of her own.

Merrill chuckled. She drove the knife into the wall, so it stuck there, and bent over Aveline to lick a stripe up her wound. She looked so lovely with blood welling up and spilling over that milky skin. And the blood tasted salty and rich and Merrill lapped at it eagerly, enjoying the smeared patterns her tongue was leaving behind.

She rocked her hips gently against Aveline’s but not yet. _Not yet_.

She coated her hands and traced vallaslin over Aveline’s abdomen, tracing the muscles like a testament to Andruil.

“So now that you’ve just left all this here, I’m going to use it,” Merrill announced, palming the wounds with her hands. She let the blood mist around them, and coalesce on her fingertips like drops of lyrium.

She bent down, before Aveline got the idea she was open to answering questions. She licked over the wound on Aveline’s other side, and felt the woman shudder. And when she shifted back to retake her place between Aveline’s legs, she held the blood in her jaw, rolling it lazily over her tongue.

She focussed a moment to make the magic manifest properly on her fingertips. She didn’t need to see Anders’s dirty spells in action to know that he was probably better at them than she was. She could tell from his notes that they were suited for the way he worked with magic – with the focus on elemental and primal magic and the same delicate touch that went into his healing. Merrill knew she could only cast more raw and forceful than he would have. She tested a couple fingers on her own skin and, sure enough, the ice that had overtaken them was cold enough that it sizzled and burned on contact.

This is what she had, though, and she would use it. She stamped a few fingers into Aveline’s abdomen, and relished Aveline’s little hissed and whimpers. Before reaching down to brush the fingers against the insides of Aveline’s thighs instead.

Aveline was wetter than ever, and Merrill scooched forward to plant her jaw directly into Aveline’s cunt and let the blood ooze from her mouth, before reaching her tongue out to lap up at her entrance and press inside her.

It was overwhelming with the entirety of her face pressed against Aveline, rubbing her tongue and nose and jaw into the folds, and coating herself with blood and slick. Aveline was crying out louder now, as Merrill circled the rim, and continued to brush icy fingers over Aveline’s thighs and the outermost edges of her sex. Merrill swirled her tongue inside, ducked up and down to press her the tip of her nose into Aveline, and then back out to graze it against her clit.

Aveline was saying things now, spewing encouragement or curses or cries of pain and pleasure, and Merrill couldn’t really hear her. She was balancing too many things with the ice at her hands and the movements of her tongue and needing to hold Aveline in place, and she was drunk on so much blood and magic and Aveline gushing, gushing for her. And she wondered if this was what Aveline tasted like on her period, all this slick and blood mixed together and heady to the touch. But, no, that was silly. She probably had a different taste then.

Merrill pushed the thought out of her mind, and focussed for one last spell, drawing raw magic up through her mouth and to reach up past her tongue and into Aveline in grazing tendrils. And it only took a few more laps of her tongue, circling the rim of Aveline’s opening, and a few more nuzzles of her face against Aveline’s clit, and Aveline was convulsing and gushing and squirting.

Merrill drew back when it seemed apt. She wiped at her face. The spell she’d cast over her fingers were gone, but she took a moment to admire the patterned collection of freeze burn scars that she’d dotted over Aveline’s thighs and _oh_! She’d done this, and she’d done all of it.

She scrambled out of her leggings in a way she was sure was too frantic and awkward to be appealing, but it barely mattered. She hurried to sit up straight and wrap her legs around Aveline’s thigh, straddling it neatly. Aveline’s thigh was so thick, and her quadriceps were so well developed, they were hard and ridged, and Merrill moved automatically to grind her hips down against them.

She braced her hands against Aveline’s hip and bounced up and down, back and forth along her leg. And, oh my. Merrill had hardly realised she’d gotten this worked up. But her breath was heavy and her heart was pounding inside her chest and she could barely keep her eyes open with how overwhelming all of it felt.

She recognised lazily that Aveline was looking at her with a bit of wide-eyed, fucked-out scepticism and-

“Oh, yes,” Merrill agreed between breaths. _She had said she would let Aveline see, hadn’t she?_ She wasn’t sure why anyone would much care to see under her top. She had no muscles like Aveline, and barely any tits to speak of, but she didn’t have time to second guess it now. She reached for the bottom fringe of tunic and pulled it over her head and onto the floor in one swift movement, not pausing as she frantically ground her hips against Aveline’s leg.

There were a few peaceful moments, where she consumed with panting and shuddering and pressing down for as much friction as she could, before Aveline reared up and tackled her down to the other side of the bed with a terrifying roar.

The fear crackled through Merrill too fast and too sharp, and she squeaked and- _Creators, when had she let her hold on Aveline slip that much? What would Aveline do to her now that it had?_ Merrill flailed her arms and legs but Aveline was a firm and heavy presence over her and there was no way she could fight Aveline off with that alone. Aveline could crush her with nothing more than her forearms if she wanted to. But Merrill was so, so close to orgasmic bliss and every time she tried to fumble through her head for which spell to use, how to best twist mana and blood and magic to protect herself, her mind came up woefully blank.

Merrill whimpered, so scared and overwhelmed she felt close to tears, but Aveline wasn’t angry, it seemed. She pressed a few kisses to Merrill’s forehead and her hand between Merrill’s thighs. Merrill felt herself fall slack, like putty in Aveline’s strong hands. Aveline prodded at her entrance with a couple of fingers, and rubbed her thumb over her clit – once, twice. And that was all it took.

Merrill groaned and spasmed and rocked against the woman above her, and there was such a big keening sense of relief. To be sated and in a pair of warm arms, and to have the person you cut showering you with affection. But it was not enough of a relief, because Merrill didn’t know how to talk about this and was scared of what else they might say to one another once the post-coital high retreated.

Merrill needed that to not happen. At least not right now, not this second. She just needed to-

She drew her hands up Aveline’s sides, and felt for the wounds still open and pulled with her magic. Aveline yelped, but Merrill could only make out her own breath and then nothing at all, as she pulled a sleep spell right out of her and up and over the both of them.

==

When Merrill was very little, Marethari used to travel to her dreams. There were way to traverse the Fade, and Marethari would come to find Merrill and take her by the hand. Together they walked through its illusory sheen, and Marethari had shown her all she needed to know – what was safe to touch and what were traps set by spirits and how to find the nexus that would let her travel as far as she needed.

The Fade had been a place full of wonders, and you could spend an eternity exploring and delving and shaping your little corner of it. Merrill had loved the Fade once. It had been a lovely place and everything had been okay.

But it hadn’t really. Things had never been okay. Her People wandered and struggled and died, her parents had been killed in a raid when she’d been too young to miss them, and the world was full of Pols who could do nothing but run from city to countryside and across nations and right into a Varterral. And Merrill hadn’t been doing anything to save the People because she was too busy living and too young to know there was anything to save.

It was like Fenris had said that one time. _It wasn't fine. You just didn't know any better._

When Merrill regained consciousness, she found herself on a little strip of land that was patches of dry dirt and grass and no place for the roots to grow underneath. Ah, the false sleep of her spell had worn off, and now all this was just lucid dreams.

She toed the little island she found herself on, and wondered how far it might stretch and where it might go if she began looking. But thought her little corner of the fade could be awful and barren, it was no longer safe to wander. The spirits knew her, and clamoured to her with offers. And she did not have enough to defend herself with. Magic did not work reliably here, and less so since Merrill had given up magic of the spirit for magic of the body. Her magic was blood, and she had no blood when she entered the Fade this way.

It was lonely and miserable here. But she should not go wandering to find others. It was better to just stay put and wait for things to end. She hoped she’d wake up soon, and Aveline would be there. Anyone out there was better than being here.

Merrill crouched to the barren land. She searched herself and found no knife, so she ripped her thumb against her tooth.

Magic did not work reliably here, but something did fall from her finger. It dripped to the ground like shiny blue lyrium. And when Merrill went to make a spell coalesce it worked more or less as she intended.

The snaring vines and brambles sprouted where pieces of her soul dropped, and grew around her protectively, like a small hut with no door and a hollow inside.

She sat and curled her knees to her chest, and the vines grew and ensnared and sprouted thorns and berries and grew in to crush Merrill’s back and sides. And the berries crushed against her in grotesque gory squelches and the thorns punctured her skin and drew lyrium like blood.

And this wasn’t even the worst of it. At least her magic had worked more or less as intended. And she’d been trapped in smaller and more painful nooks in the Fade before, and not alone, but with spirits whispering cruelties to her and waiting for her to slip up. At the very least she doubted any false prophets bearing false gifts would attempt come to her aid here, hidden here under so many vines and thorns.

And perhaps whatever simulacrum of rest her sleep spell provided had eased the need for true sleep, and she’d wake up soon. Merrill curled in closer on herself and waited. Waited and bled until she woke.

==

The flour wasn’t the best quality, but it was what Merrill had. She folded the eggs and water and honey butter into them, with a pinch of salt. And then the berries, little purple baubles in the mixture.

She crouched down onto her knees, and pulled Aveline’s shirt over her legs as she worked. The shirt was big enough to swim in, and the cast iron pan was heavy. But Merrill was used to heavier and held it firmly over the fire, until her creations were complete.

She brought a plate back, and tapped Aveline’s shoulder with a wooden spoon, until she woke. It was a dark pre-dawn outside, and Merrill was surprised they’d slept so long, between her spell and the Fade, almost a full night. But Aveline would be needed back at the Keep, and Merrill needed to be working on the Eluvian, so it was best not to leave things too much longer.

Aveline took this without complaint, as she yawned and stretched and sat up on the bed. She looked too large in it, even cowering under the sheet. She pulled it up over her breasts, though Merrill thought it a bit late for modesty.

Merrill handed her the plate and the spoon, and began to search her bedside drawer, before pulling out a health potion, a cleaned bit of cotton, and threading for stitches she doubted she’d have to use.

“Too late for shyness now,” she said, as she tugged the sheet off Aveline.

Aveline’s blush crept down her front as she was uncovered, but she held up the plate as let Merrill settle in next to her.

Merrill uncorked the health potion and dabbed the cotton at the spout, before pressing it to the bloody strip she’d cut in Aveline’s side. It had scabbed already, and Merrill supposed it might’ve even infected. But this was how Merrill tended her own cuts, when Anders was not around to do it for her, and Merrill would do what she could now. And if Aveline needed more advanced healing she could call someone up from the Gallows to do it for her. And she could figure out the lies to tell some beaten mage, for how she’d sustained wounds like freeze burnt fingerprints on her neck and stomach and thighs.

Aveline hummed in a pleased way, and relaxed into a more comfortable position with the plate Merrill had given her set on her lap. She dug into it with a spoon dripping berry red, and chewed her bite fully before speaking.

“You know, I think you might’ve missed the point of this exercise,” Aveline gave an exasperated huff and smiled. “I doubt a maleficar is going to capture me and cut me up for spells, and then just tend my wounds and make me blueberry pancakes after.”

Merrill didn’t say anything for a long while, only leaned a little into Aveline’s side as she traced the cotton up the wound and watched the scarring and scabbing fade into a delicate pink.

She thought there were other elves that did this – woke up and cooked breakfast for their human charges, and fussed over their blemishes and pains and sacrifices while ignoring their own. But Merrill still had some pride. And she wasn’t a servant in a Hightown Manor. Aveline had come here to slum it with her, and Merrill knew to take care of the people she used.

“I _am_ a maleficar,” Merrill said, as she corked the bottle. “I am not somebody different simply because you’d like it that way. I _am_ a maleficar, and I _did_ capture you, and cut you for spells, and tend to your wounds, and make you pancakes.

“And I’d do it all again,” Merrill confessed, “if you came around a little more often.”


End file.
